Live music from the Normals and Electric Vomit, plus Chris Barry (222s) spinning classic punk all night

"Perfect Youth is a valuable and accessible addition to the study of punk in general, and to Canada's place within it." - Stephanie Hart, Quill & Quire

"Sutherland has brought the movement together with a clarity and intimacy never achieved before, and for its moments of guilelessness and raw delight, reveals the value of a scene that self-deprecates as often as it’s been dismissed." - Natalie Zina Walschots, The National Post

"Perfect Youth documents the undocumented, the unloved, the unwashed, and the foul-smelling glory of Canadian punk in its embryonic years." - Gillian McCain, co-author of Please Kill Me: The Uncensored Oral History of Punk

"Sam Sutherland's loving tribute to the True North Strong and Free punk daze explodes through the pages with a riveting blend of old-school insight and 21st Century analysis. Perfect Youth indeed!" - Steven Blush, author/filmmaker, American Hardcore

"A fascinating, necessary story written buoyantly and well, and with a whole lotta vomit." - Dave Bidini, musician and author of Writing Gordon Lightfoot

"This book presents forty years of some of the greatest moments in rock-and-roll history."—From the introduction by Debbie Harry

For 40 years, Bob Gruen’s name has been synonymous with rock and roll. From taking early photos on tour with Ike and Tina Turner, to capturing the early CBGB/Max’s Kansas City scene, to covering current stadium rockers such as Green Day, Gruen has always been at the right place at the right time—and he’s always gotten the shot.

In Rock Seen, Gruen has curated his favourite photographs from his career and paired them with intimate captions and behind-the-scenes anecdotes. This book features such iconic acts as the Clash, Led Zeppelin, the Rolling Stones, the Sex Pistols, and the Ramones, and includes an introduction by the legendary Debbie Harry. Rock on!

The Stratocaster. The Telecaster. During the quarter-century following World War II, Fender guitars didn’t just make music. They made musical history. Those spectacular years are remembered and celebrated in Fender: The Golden Age 1946-1970, a definitive book (now in a smaller paperback format), which tells the story of the Fender company and the wondrous instruments it created. The culmination of the passion and obsession of three authors who live on both sides of the Atlantic, almost ten years in development, this celebration of Fender’s “golden age,” 1946-1970, includes:

- Over 250 spectacular photos of Fender guitars, including many of the rarest instruments from private collections

- The largest collection of Fender ephemera ever assembled, including every catalog, every price list and Fender Facts newsletter, along with hundreds of advertisements and promotional items.

- The comprehensive account of Fender’s golden age, from its humble beginnings through its creative heyday, and five years beyond its sale to CBS in 1965.

A unique look at some of the finest musical instruments ever produced, Fender: The Golden Age will be irresistible to anyone interested in guitars, rock ’n’ roll, or mid-century American collectibles and ephemera. Like the guitars it documents, the book simply brings down the house.

Bob Mould has just released his autobiography, See A Little Light. Mould was the singer of Husker Du and Sugar, and has continued to record and tour under his own name. I was a huge Husker Du fan and a pretty big fan of Sugar and his solo efforts as well. If you grew up a fan of Husker Du, you are going to love reading his memoir. It is honest, fast paced and intersects with tons of musical icons that likely played a big role in your coming of age.
I will ruin one surprise for you. Where does the name Husker Du come from anyway? From a board game contested between adults and kids, where the kids usually win.

I just finished reading this amazing memoir. It is not due to publish until May, 2011, but this post has two objectives. One is to succintly tell you to read this book if you have the stomach for a brutally honest and amazingly well written memoir. The other is to air my own personal experience of reading the book and the consideration of how the reading experience and the impact of the book would have been vastly different had it been an enhanced e-book.

Jack Grisham, former lead singer of California hardcore punk band TSOL, has written an incredibly honest, disturbring and beautifully written memoir of his very troubled youth.

It is hard to put my finger on why it resonated so strongly with me as I moved from despising him to feeling sympathy for him, but I don't think that I have ever read anything so honest, and in the end it is this honesty that makes this such a moving autobiography of a seriously troubled young man. Given the alcohol and drug fueled life he led, many of the details are probably a bit hazy, but for him to put pen to paper to recount this part of his life, it is certainly not to boast of any of these feats. This amazing memor is not for the faint of heart, and it is much, much more than a document about life as the lead singer of TSOL.

The other reason for this post is related to the reading experience, which for me was by reading a printed galley. Throughout my reading of the book, I knew that when I finished I would go to youtube to see footage of a TSOL show and to see what the author, Jack Grisham, actually looks like, (since he regularly refers to himself as gorgeous and big - 6'3" in the book). I intentionally did not do this until I was done as I knew that it would influence the way in which I read the book and understood the author. Had it been an enhanced e-book on an ipad for instance, there would likely have been the same videos embedded into the narrative which I would have absolutely watched while reading the book. Having finished the book and created in my mind's eye an image of what Jack looks like and an impression of what kind of person he is, seeing the videos after the fact surprised me in terms of what he looks like, and they softened the impression I have of what kind of a person he is. My point is that the experience and the intensity of emotion that I had in reading the book without any video images or video interruption for me was clearly more impactful, despite the fact that I wanted to see the video images as soon as I finished the book. I am sure for others having an enhanced e-book experience will be preferrable, but for me the linear book was completely immersive and I can only guess, much more impactful. Had I bounced back and forth between interviews, live concert footage, etc, I am sure I would have finished the book with a different and less intense sense of the tragic and brutal youth that Jack lived and imposed on many others.

If I haven't bored you yet, had I been given the choice in reading this book between the book format and the nature of how that narrative unfolds, and the ehnaced multi-media book that a book like this might also evole into, I would hands down choose the linear unfolding of the traditional paper book narrative for maximum impact.

An American Demon. By Jack Grisham. Published by ECW Press - May, 2011. 9781550229561.